The purpose of this program is to train physician-scientists and post-doctoral PhD scientists in aspects of the pathophysiological processes that occur after traumatic injury and critical illness. We aim to prepare these individuals for academic careers as independent investigators and educators. Through a multidisciplinary and collaborative effort, trainees learn how to identify important research questions, how to design, conduct and analyze experiments that will address these questions and how to translate their findings into clinically relevant interventions. Important characteristics of this program include its multidisciplinary training faculty, combining didactic educational opportunities with "hands-on" research experience and a history of success in training academicians. In these next five years, we propose to build upon the Program's history of successfully educating scientists and clinician-scientists and meet the challenges of training new scientists for the future. In part, these challenges include a set of "key initiatives" defined by the leaders at the National Institutes of Health. These key initiatives have been coined the "NIH Roadmap" and have direct bearing on the structure and direction of this training program. Briefly, the key initiatives or themes are three: (1) New Pathways to Discovery, (2) Research Teams of the Future and (3) Reengineering the Clinical Research Enterprise. We propose to continue to educate trainees in established molecular biology techniques and will expand their training to include cutting edge research and analysis (i.e. biomedical computing) techniques. Through collaborations with basic scientists and integration with the available research education programs at the University of Washington, we will expose trainees to broad-based research teams and programs. Finally, trainee education and experience will include concepts of translational research, whereby basic observations will be evaluated as potential diagnostic and therapeutic benefit for critically ill patients.